Automobile insurance is a necessity for virtually all automobile owners in the United States and in many other countries. The price of automobile insurance typically is high, and premium payments for automobile insurance during the course of a single year often equal a significant proportion of the resale value of the insured vehicle. The price of automobile insurance is even higher for persons who, for any of a variety of reasons, do not have perfect driving records. Automobile insurance in part is expensive because of the variety of types of specific insurance that are required. For example, automobile insurance can include collision insurance for accidents caused by the insured, uninsured or underinsured motorists insurance coverage for accidents in which the insured driver or his property are harmed by another who does not have proper insurance, and comprehensive insurance for damage to the insured vehicle that does not occur during an accident with another vehicle.
Although automobile insurance is expensive for all automobile owners, automobile insurance is particularly expensive for the owners of luxury and other high-priced vehicles. The automobile insurance is expensive for several reasons, including the high value of the automobiles involved, and also because such cars are popular targets for automobile theft. Owners of sports cars typically must pay particularly exorbitant rates for their automobile insurance, particularly if the owners are male, young and unmarried, because of the increased probability of reckless driving. Additionally, luxury automobile insurance is often priced at a premium relative to other automobile insurance because such insurance is a specialty, luxury good for which the market will bear a higher price.
Insurance for luxury automobiles is particularly costly in view of the fact that many individuals who own and drive luxury automobiles only do so on a limited basis. In particular, many individuals limit their usage of their luxury automobiles to very restricted times. For example, owners of expensive sports cars often only drive their cars during the summer months. Moreover, these owners often restrict their driving of their sports cars to even narrower periods of time such as weekends or evenings. Further, many individuals limit their usage of their luxury automobiles to within restricted geographical regions such as certain suburbs, or limit their usage in other ways. Thus, it would be desirable for many luxury automobile owners to have an option to purchase limited insurance coverage for their automobiles that was restricted to cover operation of the automobiles only during such restricted periods of time, to within such restricted geographical regions, or in accordance with other restrictions.
Despite these preferences of luxury automobile owners for only limited driving, conventional systems for providing insurance require an automobile owner to obtain more extensive insurance coverage that is not restricted to cover only the limited driving of the owners. For example, conventional systems of insurance companies typically require that an automobile owner pay for insurance for at least one month at a time, if not longer, and insurance that is applicable to driving within an entire country. Although many conventional systems for providing automobile insurance require insurance applicants to provide certain minimal information relating to the intended usage of the insured automobile such as, for example, the residence location at which the automobile owner will usually park the automobile, the providing of this information does not allow insurance applicants to obtain insurance coverage that is accurately tailored to their driving preferences. Indeed, the required information typically is only (at most) indirectly indicative of the true driving preferences of the insurance applicants, and the insurance provided is not strictly limited to usage in accordance with the specified information. For example, residence information is only indirectly indicative of the areas in which an automobile will be driven and, even though a particular residence is specified by an insurance applicant, the insurance applicant need not always park the automobile in the residence location specified once the insurance is being provided.
It would therefore be advantageous for automobile owners, particularly luxury automobile owners, to be able to obtain insurance coverage that was more closely restricted to their exact times of usage of their automobiles. It would additionally be advantageous for such automobile owners to be able to obtain insurance coverage that was tailored more closely to the owner's needs in terms of other factors such as geographical regions of usage. It would further be advantageous for automobile owners if a system existed that allowed the automobile owners to easily and repeatedly specify, to an automobile insurance company or other related party, a variety of conditions under which the owners would or would not drive or otherwise utilize their automobiles. It would further be advantageous for automobile owners if the system facilitated the creation of contractual arrangements between the automobile owners and automobile insurance providers according to which insurance coverage would be provided only for automobile operation during the specific times, within the specified regions of usage, or corresponding to other criteria chosen by the automobile owners. It would additionally be advantageous if a similar system existed for providing insurance with respect to other insurable items, such as boats.